"It's too slow!" we said. "Too expensive!" And we were generally right, as a study by the New America Foundation's Open Technology Institute found that US consumers pay more for slower service than counterparts in other countries.

But 2013 wasn't just more of the same—there were big developments that make 2014 worth watching, for good and bad reasons. Inspired by Google Fiber, cities are increasingly looking for ways to get their own fiber networks and give the US broadband market much-needed competition. On the potentially bad side of the equation, a legal challenge to network neutrality laws by Verizon could further degrade competition, particularly in streaming video.

As we look back at 2013 and ahead to next year, let's start with the good news. Google Fiber came to Kansas City in late 2012 and is headed to Provo, Utah, and Austin, Texas, in 2014. Google isn't about to wire up the whole country, and it's far from the first to install fiber-to-the-home networks. But the Web company's entry into the ISP market showed that competition does benefit consumers. In Austin, Google's planned network spurred AT&T to bring fiber to homes with download speeds of 300Mbps today and a gigabit next year. (One caveat: AT&T's standard service comes with ads targeted to you based on your Web history.) Even communities that didn't win the Google Fiber lottery are taking it upon themselves to lure fiber providers as an alternative to cable or DSL.

These cities are still planning to rely on ISPs, hoping that incentives can lure a new provider or convince existing ones to build out fiber networks to rival Google's.

Some communities are taking more direct control over their fates. In Leverett, Mass., planning that began in 2011 is expected to result in the deployment next year of a fiber-to-the-home network "that will be operated by a publicly controlled Municipal Light Plant entity," a case study by Harvard researchers said. "The MLP will operate independently of Leverett’s political infrastructure, but will be required by state law to charge subscribers no more than the cost of providing service."

This month, the city of Ellensburg, Washington, approved a contract to begin construction of a publicly owned fiber network. Officials in Chattanooga, Tennessee, previously showed how a government-run fiber network can rival or surpass a private one. Residents there can purchase 100Mbps connections for $57.99 a month and gigabit connections for $69.99 a month from the community-owned electric utility. It even helped residents who subscribe to traditional ISPs—after the network launched in 2011, incumbents Comcast and AT&T finally started upgrading their services, utility officials told Ars.

Another approach is for cities to create an open network that can be used by any provider to sell Internet. The Utopia network in Utah is perhaps the best example, but its mixed track record may be holding back the open access model.

"The network is deep in debt while serving a fraction of those they intended to," Christopher Mitchell, director of the Telecommunications as Commons Initiative at the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, told Ars. "On the other hand, Utopia has some of the fastest Internet access in the nation and affordable rates, and people who have access have a real choice in providers. Plus it encouraged Comcast and US West [now CenturyLink] to expedite their local investments."

Lessons were learned in Utah that can help other cities looking to bypass the private market, Mitchell believes. Still, he notes that "the open access model has been set back by Utopia's experience, and Utopia is regularly cited by those who try to convince cities to just let the 'private sector' solve this—as though it were a functioning market."

In 2014, we'll find out just how the plans of Los Angeles, Louisville, Bryan/College Station, Leverett, Ellensburg, and other cities pan out. Although competition is still distressingly absent in much of America, one thing that's clear is numerous cities are no longer content to simply accept what few options ISPs give them.

Now for the bad news...

While US residents rarely have many good choices of home Internet providers, at least we have the guarantee that ISPs can't place any giant restrictions on what content we can access over the Internet.

That's because of the Federal Communication Commission's 2010 Open Internet Order, a set of network neutrality rules that forbid ISPs from blocking services or charging content providers for access to their networks.

If the law were overturned, ISPs could more easily steer customers to their own services and away from those of their rivals. They could charge companies like Netflix for the right to have their videos prioritized over other types of Internet traffic, perhaps indirectly raising the price consumers pay for streaming video and making it more difficult for startups to compete against established players who can afford the "Internet fast lane" fees.

That's what Verizon wants, as its lawsuit to overturn the network neutrality law went to court in September. A ruling is likely to come in early 2014 from the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.

The appeals court judges were skeptical of the FCC's arguments in favor of network neutrality, giving cheer to opponents of the law and reason to worry for consumer advocates.

"We believe a DC Circuit panel majority signaled today at oral arguments that it’s inclined to pare back FCC Open Internet rules in a way that would allow cable and telco broadband providers to charge Internet edge providers for improved connections to broadband customers," the telecom analyst firm Stifel wrote after a September court proceeding. "At the same time, the panel seemed inclined to uphold the FCC’s authority to regulate broadband to some extent… Such an outcome could give telcos and cable new flexibility to strike paid-prioritization deals for offering better service to Internet edge providers (e.g., Google, Amazon, Netflix), which could also include media companies (e.g., Disney, Fox, CBS, Viacom, Time Warner Cable). Whether it would be good or bad for edge/media providers would depend on their business plans and financial wherewithal, but it could create faster 'toll' lanes that give big edge players advantages over upstarts."

ISPs can already degrade the quality of rival video services indirectly by refusing to upgrade the peering infrastructure that lets traffic pass from one network to another, or by refusing to use caching systems that improve the quality of services like Netflix and YouTube. Gutting the Open Internet Order would let ISPs take more direct aim at their rivals.

Further Reading

Some members of Congress are concerned about ISPs limiting consumers' choice in video services. US Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) has proposed comprehensive legislation to restrict the ways ISPs can overcharge customers and degrade the quality of rival online video services, while boosting the FCC's ability to regulate.

Rockefeller wants to prevent ISPs from using data caps to discriminate against third-party services, an important goal as Comcast and other cable providers are likely to increase the use of caps in 2014, making you pay more if you use a lot of bandwidth-heavy services.

There is also reason to worry about newly sworn-in FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler's approach to network neutrality. In recent comments, he seemed to accept as inevitable a future in which Netflix will have to pay ISPs to get high-quality access to consumers.

"I am a firm believer in the market," he said in response to a question after a policy speech. “I think we’re also going to see a two-sided market where Netflix might say, ‘well, I’ll pay in order to make sure that you might receive, my subscriber receives, the best possible transmission of this movie.’ I think we want to let those kinds of things evolve. We want to observe what happens from that, and we want to make decisions accordingly, but I go back to the fact that the marketplace is where these decisions ought to be made, and the functionality of a competitive marketplace dictates the degree of regulation."

Wheeler was asked by US Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) to clarify what he meant in a subsequent congressional hearing. Wheeler responded:

I am strong supporter of the Open Internet rules, full stop. The rules were written in such a way as to envision opportunities for innovation and experimentation, and to impose on them a balance between protecting the open Internet, protection consumers, and stimulating innovation. New ideas under the Open Internet order, new ideas such as those you have referenced, in a wireless environment particularly, are not prohibited. But there is a clear responsibility for the Commission to make sure that what takes place does not interfere with Internet access, is not anticompetitive, and does not provide preferential treatment. And we will enforce that. We will maintain the balance between innovation and ensuring there is an open Internet.

Wheeler's reference to "a wireless environment" is potentially important, because the Open Internet Order's rules generally apply to wired Internet rather than cellular service. Still, he hasn't quite answered the question of whether Netflix could be forced to pay ISPs for better access to consumers of fixed Internet service, even though such a scenario would likely violate the FCC's rules. We've asked an FCC spokesman for a more specific answer or an interview with Wheeler, but no further clarification seems to be coming.

All of this is to say that there are many reasons to watch what happens in the US Internet market in 2014 and beyond. We don't know just how far fiber deployments will advance next year or how the regulatory questions will be resolved, but the issues we've described are sure to have a big impact on broadband prices, competition, and quality of service.

The problem here is that monopolies have a greater incentive to keep things as they are in the market because they can profit on data caps, speed upgrades, and prioritization. Once someone comes in to threaten to steal their customer base, the potential loss of profits are the only reason why they finally give in and upgrade the line. Competition is truly the only way to spur innovation and benefit the progress of society; otherwise, they are simply going to milk you as long as possible with a false, self-imposed sense of scarcity.

Times like this it's important to remember that the US has already paid the ISPs 200 billion dollars to build fiber to the home to 90% of Americans by the year 2006. And we never asked for a refund.

Where are you getting this information from? I'm familiar with how heavily the government has subsidized ISP's, but I wasn't aware of any government effort for FTTH, especially not to the tune of 200 billion.

The problem here is that monopolies have a greater incentive to keep things as they are in the market because they can profit on data caps, speed upgrades, and prioritization. Once someone comes in to threaten to steal their customer base, the potential loss of profits are the only reason why they finally give in and upgrade the line. Competition is truly the only way to spur innovation and benefit the progress of society; otherwise, they are simply going to milk you as long as possible with a false, self-imposed sense of scarcity.

Well, then people are going to back off on universal access because having to wire an entire town is often what keeps competitors out. Here in my town, they drove out FIOS because it wouldn't agree to wire up every neighborhood in exchange for a TV permit. FIOS sold what fiber they did lay down and I'm lucky enough to have it, but I can't get TV service through it because the whole town is not fibered.

Times like this it's important to remember that the US has already paid the ISPs 200 billion dollars to build fiber to the home to 90% of Americans by the year 2006. And we never asked for a refund.

Where are you getting this information from? I'm familiar with how heavily the government has subsidized ISP's, but I wasn't aware of any government effort for FTTH, especially not to the tune of 200 billion.

The Telecom Act of 1996. It deregulated ISPs, allowing them to raise rates and have less competition in exchange for an agreement to build a fiber in the home network to 90% of US households. It would need to have a 45 Mbit/second bidirectional connection to meet the terms of the law. Not one state has met that goal. During the ten years between 96 and 06 the increased rates come out to approximately $2000 for each of the approximately 100 million households that have internet connections.Here's a PBS story on it: http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/2007 ... 02683.html

Times like this it's important to remember that the US has already paid the ISPs 200 billion dollars to build fiber to the home to 90% of Americans by the year 2006. And we never asked for a refund.

Where are you getting this information from? I'm familiar with how heavily the government has subsidized ISP's, but I wasn't aware of any government effort for FTTH, especially not to the tune of 200 billion.

The Telecom Act of 1996. It deregulated ISPs, allowing them to raise rates and have less competition in exchange for an agreement to build a fiber in the home network to 90% of US households. It would need to have a 45 Mbit/second bidirectional connection to meet the terms of the law. Not one state has met that goal. During the ten years between 96 and 06 the increased rates come out to approximately $2000 for each of the approximately 100 million households that have internet connections.Here's a PBS story on it: http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/2007 ... 02683.html

The problem here is that monopolies have a greater incentive to keep things as they are in the market because they can profit on data caps, speed upgrades, and prioritization. Once someone comes in to threaten to steal their customer base, the potential loss of profits are the only reason why they finally give in and upgrade the line. Competition is truly the only way to spur innovation and benefit the progress of society; otherwise, they are simply going to milk you as long as possible with a false, self-imposed sense of scarcity.

It's more a matter of control over the price per bit. Recall that Comcast and most cable ISPs have been increasing speeds incrementally over the past few years. That's just because they want to be able to market faster speeds. Over the past few months Comcast has been getting customers to upgrade their DOCSIS1.1 modems to DOCSIS 3.1 so that Comcast can retire some legacy upstream modulation. This is so once again Comcast can incrementally increase speeds. Similar activity has been happening with DSL providers, as their technology evolves and they push fiber closer to the home.

Wireless (cellular) carriers have traditionally been unable to compete for home service, but with LTE and increases in spectrum, I have a feeling they will soon be offering a light-use home service just because they can. If done right they could market and deploy by cell tower and use very tight beam antenna arrays to provide service, since they know the devices are fixed. Don't look for much more than a 2Mbps service level, but if priced right that's more than enough for a lot of people (who don't read Ars Technica daily).

When a fiber player comes in, it will destroy the market, just as cable destroyed the T channel based market in the 2000s. The difference this time is that the incumbent players are watching and aren't going to let that happen until they're good and ready for it. Cable operators are already talking about Gigabit DOCSIS, and all phone companies, not just Verizon, are deploying fiber in selected areas today. But the rollout is going at the pace the operators want it to go, because they have a lot of margin to maintain and a lot of hardware to deploy.

The Telecom Act of 1996. It deregulated ISPs, allowing them to raise rates and have less competition in exchange for an agreement to build a fiber in the home network to 90% of US households. It would need to have a 45 Mbit/second bidirectional connection to meet the terms of the law. Not one state has met that goal.

Times like this it's important to remember that the US has already paid the ISPs 200 billion dollars to build fiber to the home to 90% of Americans by the year 2006. And we never asked for a refund.

Right on. That “the government” (ultimately meaning we, through taxes) “has paid…to build” is just the point. In our neighborhoods, for example, city government at least subsidizes, if not pays for, the laying of cables for TV/internet along with landline telephony, electricty, sewage, and water, underground in easements for all new developments. Why should not ALL these be treated as *available* public utilities?

I agree with the author: the real fight in 2014 will be over IPTV, not gigabit Internet. There are enough smart TVs, Roku boxes, PS-3s and even tablets out there to make a lot of people question why they're paying so much for TV. It wasn't that long ago that 10¢ per minute long distance phone calls were a "good deal" and touch tones cost an extra buck a month. Cell phones with unlimited long distance and Skype for international calling destroyed all that. Unless you're really into football (which happens to make up a huge percentage of your pay-TV monthly bill), the price per hour of cable really isn't in line with other entertainment. Right now it's a little bit difficult (or at least different enough) for the average person to switch to an (American style) IPTV solution. But like calling long distance on cheap cell phones instead of expensive land lines, if the effort saves a significant amount of money over time people will catch on.

At some point video delivery companies will wake up and notice all the customers who drop service. They're already very much aware of the increase in data use. If they're smart they'll embrace the change and revise their offering, maybe even dropping unwatched channels (and you know they are out there) in favor of putting that bandwidth to better use for Internet or video on demand.

Of course, for telcos that's not as much of a switch. They've operated under common carrier rules for decades and never really had a viable video business. Cable companies will be putting up a huge fight to extract some revenue from the IPTV providers, but what they really should be doing is fight to get better deals from content providers.

A former ESPN senior executive recalled a gathering of his colleagues where “everyone toasted to the concept of compounding”— that is, increases in subscriber fees that several years grew at a compounded annual rate of 20 percent. The current $5.54 average monthly price for ESPN is more than four times the fee for the next most expensive national network.

Disney/EPSN is the elephant in the room, but why should you pay for channels you never watch? The argument goes that programming that would never be viable wouldn't happen, but that seems to have been turned upside down with all the bundling of channels and media consolidation that's taken place. When 4 companies control 90% of the TV channels there's no diversity in programming, just a fight for production dollars and the same old gatekeepers.

Of course, in the long run, unless you can bet on it, TV will go the podcast model, with thousands of RSS feeds pushing content out to your smart TVs, some free, some charged, some in-between. If you can bet on it (sports, etc), you'll get the feed for free through your preferred gambling establishment.

It's not just megabits per second that is important in an internet connection, it's also the number of milliseconds in a response time. In player versus player games, having response times of 100 ms or less is highly preferred. I have Comcast, and while our megabits per second is generally okay, I get periods in the day where I have tried to run a PvP game only to discover I have response time of 1000+ ms, which is just plain impossible to actively play. I don't know if it's a limitation of internet cable, or how many customers are on one string of cable length. I would love to get Fiber in the area, and had it briefly before I had to move a number of years ago. It was pretty awesome for that very brief time. I would like to see more Internet Service Providers rated not just for the average Mps they can deliver but for the average millisecond response time to the outside internet in general, and not just their own internal "preferred" services they want to sell you.

If my city offers fiber-to-home service for only rates that cover the cost of building/maintaining the network...I would have no need for the "market" that has relentlessly charged me more and more for less and less. As soon as I can stop giving these D-bags at TWC and optimum my money, I most certainly will.

I can't take Wheeler seriously when he says competitive market when most people suffer with a monopoly or duopoly. Broadband is not a competitive market and it is structurally very unlikely to ever be one. It ought to be treated as a utility and regulated in the public interest. Comcast, Verizon, AT&T, TW Cable are all immensely profitable companies and there is no way they ought to be able to charge me twice as much as the "market price" (when comparing to broadband prices in other countries) and then charge Netflix (but really me again) to send me the data I requested.

The FCC is so captured by Cable and Phone giants that it will never act in the public interest. The FCC ought to be abolished entirely in favor of an independent regulatory agency with a single administrator. It should also just enforce the Communications Act as written and it should never have carved out a special exception for broadband as it did.

Commissions are almost always captured by industry because they are required to be politically "balanced" and the end result is that GOP Presidents appoint GOP industry lobbyists and Dem Presidents appoint Democratic industry lobbyists.

Think of what would happen if a 'fast lane' was applied to the water supply...

First swimming pools would get a fast lane so that they could be quickly filled via a mandatory fee. While the pool is filling pressure drops everywhere else. People complained about the pressure drop so a 'fast lane' for baths was built at a charge of $2/bath. That caused even more pressure drops and we got a 'fast lane' for toilet flushes at $1 each. Worried about the extreme pressure drops in the common pipe monthly caps of 100gal/month were implemented. This drove even more people to use 'fast lane' services. Now the common pipes just trickle out untreated, undrinkable water since no one takes care of them anymore. Water has switched to a fully 'fast lane' model where every use is fee driven.

It so much better now. Water bills have tripled. Pool water is $0.01/gal and drinking water is $20.00/gal. We get 'blackouts' while there are disputes over various 'fast lane' fees. And we have to wait six months or more before new types of devices can be approved for attachment to the pipes. Profits at the water companies are up 10x since they are now delivering half the water and selling it at much higher markups. Consumers are much better off now too -- you can fill your pool in an hour instead of twenty hours under the old system!

I'm in a market, Austin, that is seeing some upgrades, but I'm not very optimistic for 2014. AT&T will offer gigabit to new areas with FTTH, but for most of the city with FTTN, only a modest upgrade to 45/6 is being planned and even that may take some time. As of now, only 18/1.5 is available at my address. Time Warner seems content with offering 50/5 max; though, they're offering $10/mo. off for new subscribers for a year. Google Fiber will have very limited installs in Austin in 2014, since it won't be live anywhere until mid-2014 and AT&T is trying to delay Google Fiber by denying access to the telephone poles that they own. Wealthier suburbs and towns may also get access faster than large cities that keep universal access requirements.

On the TV side, I see more streaming tied to higher tiered cable subscriptions like ESPN. I noticed that Fox is now doing this on Roku and since Time Warner doesn't have agreement with them, I can't get Fox's Roku channel.

Defined as "A rule of order having the force of law, prescribed by a superior or competent authority, relating to the actions of those under the authority's control."

Then you are misreading your own dictionary definition. There is a word for a rule with force of law and that word is 'regulation' not 'law'. By using the word 'law' you are implying to the reader that the rule in question was passed by Congress and signed by the President, in other words implying something which is not true.

Then you are misreading your own dictionary definition. There is a word for a rule with force of law and that word is 'regulation' not 'law'. By using the word 'law' you are implying to the reader that the rule in question was passed by Congress and signed by the President, in other words implying something which is not true.

This - I chewed on that sentence quite a bit, decided to let it go, but then Jon's response made me want to weigh in here.

Times like this it's important to remember that the US has already paid the ISPs 200 billion dollars to build fiber to the home to 90% of Americans by the year 2006. And we never asked for a refund.

Where are you getting this information from? I'm familiar with how heavily the government has subsidized ISP's, but I wasn't aware of any government effort for FTTH, especially not to the tune of 200 billion.

The Telecom Act of 1996. It deregulated ISPs, allowing them to raise rates and have less competition in exchange for an agreement to build a fiber in the home network to 90% of US households. It would need to have a 45 Mbit/second bidirectional connection to meet the terms of the law. Not one state has met that goal. During the ten years between 96 and 06 the increased rates come out to approximately $2000 for each of the approximately 100 million households that have internet connections.Here's a PBS story on it: http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/2007 ... 02683.html

Wonderful.

Now find a source with citations that isn't solely from the opinion section of PBS.

For such a big scandal I find it interesting that this seems to be the only coverage of it other than a few tech blogs linking to this same uncited PBS article. Hell even Ars which has been on a tangent about the state of US Broadband fails to write about it. Something is just a little fishy here.

Aside from that even doing original research on the Telco Act of 1996 I fail to find any reference to this proposed universal broadband access.

I think all one has to do is look at where Google has gone in and offered their internet service to see a very clear and concrete example that our current broadband market is not competitive. Google announces a new market and all of a sudden the incumbents start improving their plans making them faster and/or cheaper and start upgrading their infrastructure. If it was already a competitive market then this wouldn't happen at all or would be relatively minor as that type of thing would be occurring already. With that said I also think that Google adding fiber everywhere isn't the answer as they aren't any where near being capable of doing that and they've so far avoided any universal service requirements which is a legitimate gripe by the incumbents IMO.

If we can't count on the incumbents to operate a competitive market and Google or other companies like Google isn't the answer then what is? Well the realities of the situation are that it needs to be a utility like power or water because installing multiple networks is expensive, difficult and ultimately pointless which leads to a couple options.

1) Heavy regulation of a private company.2) Publicly run utility.3) Publicly run infrastructure with any private company that wants to able to provide service over the infrastructure.

Personally, I think 3 is the best option as that allows the most flexibility and most competition to give something resembling a free market. Want to make a ISP for "technical" people that provides limited or no tech support but is cheaper? Sounds good. Want to provide a "safe" internet by having isp level content filtering for families? Go for it. Want to try to target light users with cheap plans? Sure. Want to sell a premium service for gamers with low latency? Why not. These kinds of things can happen with #3 but can't reasonably in the other two but the Public utility should be better than 1 especially if we allow the incumbents to remain and compete with the PU.

With that said I consider myself lucky in that we have Frontier fios, Comcast and Clear available in the area so my local market seems to be more competitive than your typical cable/DSL duopoly. My current 15/5 plan for 30$ a month isn't bad compared to some peoples options in the US but is still more expensive and/or slower than what you'd get in a lot of other countries.

Defined as "A rule of order having the force of law, prescribed by a superior or competent authority, relating to the actions of those under the authority's control."

Then you are misreading your own dictionary definition. There is a word for a rule with force of law and that word is 'regulation' not 'law'. By using the word 'law' you are implying to the reader that the rule in question was passed by Congress and signed by the President, in other words implying something which is not true.

If I was implying it came from Congress or the President I wouldn't have written the "Federal Communication Commission's 2010 Open Internet Order."

Times like this it's important to remember that the US has already paid the ISPs 200 billion dollars to build fiber to the home to 90% of Americans by the year 2006. And we never asked for a refund.

Where are you getting this information from? I'm familiar with how heavily the government has subsidized ISP's, but I wasn't aware of any government effort for FTTH, especially not to the tune of 200 billion.

The Telecom Act of 1996. It deregulated ISPs, allowing them to raise rates and have less competition in exchange for an agreement to build a fiber in the home network to 90% of US households. It would need to have a 45 Mbit/second bidirectional connection to meet the terms of the law. Not one state has met that goal. During the ten years between 96 and 06 the increased rates come out to approximately $2000 for each of the approximately 100 million households that have internet connections.Here's a PBS story on it: http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/2007 ... 02683.html

Wonderful.

Now find a source with citations that isn't solely from the opinion section of PBS.

For such a big scandal I find it interesting that this seems to be the only coverage of it other than a few tech blogs linking to this same uncited PBS article. Hell even Ars which has been on a tangent about the state of US Broadband fails to write about it. Something is just a little fishy here.

Aside from that even doing original research on the Telco Act of 1996 I fail to find any reference to this proposed universal broadband access.

I can't take Wheeler seriously when he says competitive market when most people suffer with a monopoly or duopoly. Broadband is not a competitive market and it is structurally very unlikely to ever be one. It ought to be treated as a utility and regulated in the public interest. Comcast, Verizon, AT&T, TW Cable are all immensely profitable companies and there is no way they ought to be able to charge me twice as much as the "market price" (when comparing to broadband prices in other countries) and then charge Netflix (but really me again) to send me the data I requested.

The FCC is so captured by Cable and Phone giants that it will never act in the public interest. The FCC ought to be abolished entirely in favor of an independent regulatory agency with a single administrator. It should also just enforce the Communications Act as written and it should never have carved out a special exception for broadband as it did.

Commissions are almost always captured by industry because they are required to be politically "balanced" and the end result is that GOP Presidents appoint GOP industry lobbyists and Dem Presidents appoint Democratic industry lobbyists.

The FCC tends to be pro consumer until Congress steps in and orders them not to be. This is even more true for the House of Representatives than the Senate. The House members do not even need to pass laws, just the threat to fire the administrators is enough.

Then you are misreading your own dictionary definition. There is a word for a rule with force of law and that word is 'regulation' not 'law'. By using the word 'law' you are implying to the reader that the rule in question was passed by Congress and signed by the President, in other words implying something which is not true.

This - I chewed on that sentence quite a bit, decided to let it go, but then Jon's response made me want to weigh in here.

It's misleading and technically incorrect as written.

IIRC,

A "law" passed by congress is a Statute. A "law" made by an agency or commission can either be a rule/regulation, or it can be a private letter ruling (only binds the agency and the party that requested the ruling). A commission can also have "trials" and make binding precedent like an appeals court.

Times like this it's important to remember that the US has already paid the ISPs 200 billion dollars to build fiber to the home to 90% of Americans by the year 2006. And we never asked for a refund.

Where are you getting this information from? I'm familiar with how heavily the government has subsidized ISP's, but I wasn't aware of any government effort for FTTH, especially not to the tune of 200 billion.

The Telecom Act of 1996. It deregulated ISPs, allowing them to raise rates and have less competition in exchange for an agreement to build a fiber in the home network to 90% of US households. It would need to have a 45 Mbit/second bidirectional connection to meet the terms of the law. Not one state has met that goal. During the ten years between 96 and 06 the increased rates come out to approximately $2000 for each of the approximately 100 million households that have internet connections.Here's a PBS story on it: http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/2007 ... 02683.html

Wonderful.

Now find a source with citations that isn't solely from the opinion section of PBS.

Bruce Kushnick's reporting is the source of the claim. He's got a report hosted at the NTIA that I can't be bothered to provide a link for.

For such a big scandal I find it interesting that this seems to be the only coverage of it other than a few tech blogs linking to this same uncited PBS article. Hell even Ars which has been on a tangent about the state of US Broadband fails to write about it. Something is just a little fishy here.

Aside from that even doing original research on the Telco Act of 1996 I fail to find any reference to this proposed universal broadband access.

The telecom companies never entered into a formal contract or binding promise to do anything. The lobbied congress to deregulate their industry (and the media/content industry as well) and explained that they'd be able to do all sorts of great customer-focused things if only they had the flexibility and resources that were being bound up by telecom regulations. Then when they got more-or-less everything they asked for, they:-engaged in a buyout spree, massively consolidating the telecom and media industries-sued the federal government to prevent implementation of portions of the Telecom Act that they found objectionable (roughly-speaking, that means 'expensive')

In the above link, I cite a Common Cause report that shows pretty clearly how the Telecom Act of '96 was a great deal for a fairly small number of large corporations, and a pretty shitty deal for the US citizen. Even if you think that the $200 billion number is pure baloney (fwiw, I think that it's at best misleading when presented as a payment to the telcos), there's no doubt that the benefits bestowed on telecom and media companies in that act largely benefitted the corporations and their highest-level executives, rather than anyone else, which is ultimately the point that Mr. Kushnik and Mr. Cringeley are making when putting the big number front and center.

However it wouldn't be all cream-puffs and marshmallows like some people seem to think. Telephone service and air travel used to be operated in that way in the USA and both were quite expensive. On the other hand, the quality of service was excellent.

Additionally, although I am generally pro-union because of the nature of capitalistic business, I worry about union capture of regulated and/or publicly-owned service businesses. See BART for an example of the dangers there.

Times like this it's important to remember that the US has already paid the ISPs 200 billion dollars to build fiber to the home to 90% of Americans by the year 2006. And we never asked for a refund.

Where are you getting this information from? I'm familiar with how heavily the government has subsidized ISP's, but I wasn't aware of any government effort for FTTH, especially not to the tune of 200 billion.

The Telecom Act of 1996. It deregulated ISPs, allowing them to raise rates and have less competition in exchange for an agreement to build a fiber in the home network to 90% of US households. It would need to have a 45 Mbit/second bidirectional connection to meet the terms of the law. Not one state has met that goal. During the ten years between 96 and 06 the increased rates come out to approximately $2000 for each of the approximately 100 million households that have internet connections.Here's a PBS story on it: http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/2007 ... 02683.html

Wonderful.

Now find a source with citations that isn't solely from the opinion section of PBS.

Bruce Kushnick's reporting is the source of the claim. He's got a report hosted at the NTIA that I can't be bothered to provide a link for.

For such a big scandal I find it interesting that this seems to be the only coverage of it other than a few tech blogs linking to this same uncited PBS article. Hell even Ars which has been on a tangent about the state of US Broadband fails to write about it. Something is just a little fishy here.

Aside from that even doing original research on the Telco Act of 1996 I fail to find any reference to this proposed universal broadband access.

The telecom companies never entered into a formal contract or binding promise to do anything. The lobbied congress to deregulate their industry (and the media/content industry as well) and explained that they'd be able to do all sorts of great customer-focused things if only they had the flexibility and resources that were being bound up by telecom regulations. Then when they got more-or-less everything they asked for, they:-engaged in a buyout spree, massively consolidating the telecom and media industries-sued the federal government to prevent implementation of portions of the Telecom Act that they found objectionable (roughly-speaking, that means 'expensive')

In the above link, I cite a Common Cause report that shows pretty clearly how the Telecom Act of '96 was a great deal for a fairly small number of large corporations, and a pretty shitty deal for the US citizen. Even if you think that the $200 billion number is pure baloney (fwiw, I think that it's at best misleading when presented as a payment to the telcos), there's no doubt that the benefits bestowed on telecom and media companies in that act largely benefited the corporations and their highest-level executives, rather than anyone else, which is ultimately the point that Mr. Kushnik and Mr. Cringeley are making when putting the big number front and center.

I was trying to find the specific documents myself as I worked for one of the RBOC's that did all said above. It was widely discussed that we received funding to build out DSL. The USF (while loosely written probably at the hands of the telco's) was intended in part to fund broadband and telco deployment to everywhere at an affordable cost. If you read the entire Telecom act of '96 the information is there but it's a heavy read. Additional searches will back up our comments but it's a lot of reading and digging unfortunately.

I hear that some of the ISPs wanted to block services like Skype, and steer customers to buy phone service. At best, all they could do is possibly deprioritize that, or give it lower bandwidth. Of course, many people have let go of phone service and won't ever look back. For most people, cell phones can be sufficient for business calls and phone interviews.